By Juliet Eilperin, A federal judge in Texas blocked two key parts of the state’s controversial abortion lawMonday, ruling that one part is unconstitutional while another provision imposes an undue burden on women in some instances. The ruling by U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel represents a legal victory for abortion providers, who had challenged new requirements that abortion doctors must have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of their clinic and that all abortions must take place in surgical centers, rather than allowing women to take abortion drugs at home. Lauren Bean, spokeswoman for Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, said the state immediately appealed…

Libya’s state news agency says gunmen have stolen $54m (£33.5m) in an attack on a van carrying foreign and local currency for the Libyan central bank. Ten men stopped the van as it entered the city of Sirte from the airport. The cash delivery had been flown 300 miles (500km) from the capital, Tripoli. “The robbery is a catastrophe for the whole of Libya,” Abdel-Fattah Mohammed, head of Sirte council, told Reuters. Libya has suffered continuing lawlessness since the 2011 civil war. Guards ‘overpowered’ Libya’s government has been struggling to keep control of a country full of armed militias, gangs…

By Tabassum Zakaria WASHINGTON | Tue Oct 29, 2013 5:40am EDT (Reuters) – When top U.S. intelligence officials testified at a congressional hearing weeks ago, the public uproar was over the National Security Agency collecting the phone and email records of Americans. But when the NSA director and other spy chiefs appear at a House Intelligence Committee hearing on Tuesday it will be against a backdrop of angry European allies accusing the United States of spying on their leaders and citizens. The most prominent target appears to have been German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose mobile phone was allegedly tapped by the NSA….

QuestCinq.com – The trial of three senior Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood leaders on charges of inciting violence was halted on Tuesday after the judge said the court felt “unease” over the case. Judge Mohamed Amin Fahmi al-Qarmouty announced the decision at the start of the session and referred the case to another court. The case against Mohamed Badie, General Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, and his deputies Khairat al-Shater and Rashad Bayoumy is part of a campaign against the Islamist movement waged by the authorities since the army overthrew President Mohamed Mursi on July 3. Hundreds of Mursi supporters have been…